


The Ten of Hearts

by TrulyMightyPotato



Series: Royal Flush [10]
Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Child Death, Death, Mir is not a Nice Man, Threats
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-20 16:54:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13150947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrulyMightyPotato/pseuds/TrulyMightyPotato
Summary: Just because Freddy's is gone doesn't mean everything is. Or everyone.





	The Ten of Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Make sure to subscribe to the series to get updates.

_ February 3, 1924 _

The warehouse was quiet these days—it had been since Jack’s death. The muted sounds weren’t nearly as stifling as they had been shortly after Jack’s death, though; a spud’s laugh or cheer could be heard every so often, but it would take time still for everyone to move on.

Link cautiously peered into the room Jack and Wiishu used to share, nodding when he saw Mark listening to Billy, Betty, and Sam telling some story to the badly injured man. Chica looked up and over, then wagged her tail briefly before putting her head back to Mark’s side.

Mark was awake. That was good.

The former speakeasy owner had been slowly recovering since that fateful Christmas Eve, but it was only in the past few days he’d started being able to move around with only one person helping him instead of two.

Link would come back later to help Mark with his short daily walk. He valued time with the spuds, especially after Wiishu had broken the news about Jack, and Link didn’t want to interrupt.

Link quietly hummed to himself as he walked down the hall to the office. It was Sunday, so Rhett wouldn’t be here for long: just long enough for the two of them to be sure everything was running smoothly. Not a lot of crime went down on Sundays—everyone wanted to be with their family, and not out breaking the law.

He was sure the bulls were grateful for that. Meant they didn’t have to put as many coppers out on the streets.

“Imagine seeing you here,” Rhett said as Link walked into the office, and  Link chuckled.

“Long time no see.”

They only lived next door to each other.

“Anything new?”

Link shook his head.

“All quiet today. Makes me kind of nervous, honestly.”

“What about Mir?”

“He’s been quiet all day—the noodles, too. That’s why I’m nervous.”

Rhett let out a long breath.

“Okay.” He tapped his fingers on the desk before standing. “Let’s walk.”

They exited the room and got to the main floor of the warehouse, carefully weaving around the spuds scampering about in play.

“Careful, kids,” Link warned, “make sure nobody gets hurt—including us. We don’t want to trip on you.”

A chorus of “okay,”s and “yes, Link,”s came, and Link frowned again. Just two months ago, the words would have been accompanied by giggles and laughter as they scattered out of the way. Now, while the spuds were more lively than they were after Christmas, they were still obviously missing Jack.

The  _ crack _ of a distant gunshot sounded.

The spuds froze, then scampered for cover and behind legs for safety.

The body of the lookout  _ thudded _ dully onto the floor, tumbling from the catwalk near one of the second floor windows, blood and shattered skull bared for all. Not even sixteen yet, and his potential was reduced to a blood stain on the concrete.

If the lookout was dead, that meant-

Shouts and running footsteps sounded as the men all jumped for their weapons. Link turned to the spuds.

“Get upstairs; you know the drill.”

This time, the spuds ran in complete silence, terrified they'd be noticed if they made a sound.

Link reached for his pistol, barely having it in hand when the windows shattered, one by one. He wasn’t sure what happened to be more deafening: the echo of gunfire, or the breaking of glass. Both made him want to flinch, but years of dealing with harrowing situations steeled his nerves.

The door to the warehouse flew open, wood splintering and shrieking.

Two large men stood there, guns at the ready, and between them stood Mir. A wolf, cunning and ruthless, flanked by the equivalent of bears in human skin. There was no toothy grin on that metaphorical maw, but mirth could be seen glinting on his face, sharper than the shards of glass littering the floor. Hardly begun, and the man was already amused. It made Link sick, to witness the original Boogeyman of Boston standing on Irish soil.

“Let's make this easy,” Mir said simply. The words dripped smooth and sweet as honey off his tongue, but those that followed hinted at the poison beneath. “Give me the little fish, and you will have only one casualty this day. ”

“Fish? Sorry, fish market’s on the other side of town. Try the docks.” Link readily quipped, though he had a sneaking suspicion playing dumb would get them nowhere.

His intuition was correct, as Mir dropped his little analogy. “Mark Fischbach. I know you have him. You McLaughlins, the biggest bleeding hearts in this city. Only you would be so foolish.”

“Didn't you read the paper? He's dead.” Rhett scowled at Mir, then leveled his gun at him. “So get out.”

Mir laughed. “You don't set the terms with this.”

A gunshot  _ cracked _ through the warehouse.

Mir smirked as one of the older men went down screaming. “I wouldn’t recommend it.”

A sniper. Mir had a sniper.

And, as Link couldn’t help but notice as Rhett went to shoot, Mir had a lot of men behind him—all armed with nothing less than semi-automatic weapons. As if they’d all been waiting, anticipating the refusal and ready to cement Mir’s threat.

“Rhett,” he said softly, “we won’t win in a fight.” Not with so many of their men away from the warehouse, and Mir with such a show of force.

Rhett scowled.

“Observant,” Mir said, raising an eyebrow. “Now: Fischbach. Hand him over.”

“We told ya,” Link said, “we don’t have him.”

They had to get Mir out of here before Mark managed to get up and investigate the gunshots. There had been several now; he’d know something was wrong for sure. And he wasn’t the kind of man to just stand by and let people die for him.

Well, Link had no intentions of handing him over. Mir was a nasty piece of work in the first place, and everyone knew he had a vendetta against Mark’s older brother. Who knew what he would do to Mark if he had him.

Nothing good, that was certain.

Mir sighed. “We’re doing this the hard way, then.” He gestured, and his men all stepped forward and readied their guns.

Link barely had time to throw himself behind a crate before the air was filled with the near-deafening sounds of the guns going off and the screams and shouts of his men getting hurt and dying.

And, just as quickly as it started, it ended.

“Come now, McLaughlin, where is Fischbach?” Mir’s voice rang out in the unnatural silence. “Hand him over, and I’ll take my men and leave.” Footsteps crunched in the broken glass and splinters. “What is he to you? A speakeasy owner? A restaurant manager? A good, kind soul to all; oh, what a loss for the community….” He spat the words as if they were the most atrocious of lies ever spoken aloud, the mockery thick on his tongue. Rhett and Link wondered if he was even speaking about Mark by the end of it, or if the target of his disdain had shifted.

“We don’t have him!” Rhett shouted from wherever he’d ducked to cover. “Killing people isn’t going to change that!”

Link peeked over the edge of a nearby crate to see Mir smile and step more into the warehouse, giant bodyguards shadowing him.

“All that means, McLaughlin, is that I haven’t found the right person to kill.” Mir clasped his hands calmly behind his back, as if he wasn’t propositioning the full blown slaughter of dozens of men- and possibly children. “And let me be clear when I say this: I am more than willing to pick my way through them all, one by one, until I find that person.”

Link glanced up at the second floor, desperately hoping he wasn’t going to see Mark leaning against the railing and staring down at all the bodies in horror—desperately hoping Mark had the sense to stay out of sight and sound.

Nothing.

Good.

So occupied with hoping Mark hadn’t shown himself, Link hadn’t noticed one of Mir’s men approaching him.

When they grabbed him, they dragged him with such force that he went sprawling onto the main floor of the warehouse, getting a horrifyingly up-close view of the shattered skull and brains of the lookout who’d first been killed. So young, so  _ goddamn young _ , and all because they were desperate for men after that tragedy on Christmas Eve.

The rough hands grabbed him again, pinning his arms behind his back. And they were heavy—no matter how much Link struggled to free himself, nothing worked.

A pistol clicked softly, and Link looked up to see Mir staring down at him, pistol pointed at his face. Of course the smug bastard would want to claim such a significant hit as his own.

“Last chance, Neal. Give up Fischbach.”

Link struggled once more, trying to dislodge the person on his back. “We can’t. We don’t have him.”

Mir shrugged and pulled the trigger.

An inarticulate sound tore out of Rhett, and as Mir stepped away from Link’s body, the man who’d been pinning Link moved as well.

Rhett darted to Link, cradling him, only to nearly instantly realize that Link was already gone.

_ Link was gone. _

Rhett stood, the front of his coat soaked with his dead friend’s blood, and his eyes bright with fury.

“Stand down,” he ordered, his voice a powerful growl. There was a hesitation as both sides paused, then the Irish lowered their guns.

Mir smiled, and clasped his hands over the grip of his gun.

“I’m glad you see reason. Now-“ he tilted his head, and his smile grew again into a smirk- “give me Fischbach, before any more of your men have to die.”

“As you were told," Rhett glanced at Link's body, "we don't have one of those. You realize one got arrested and the other caught in a building fire, right? Neither of those places are here."

Mir smiled distastefully. "That's fine." He raised his pistol and pointed it at one of Rhett's men. "Senseless slaughter it is."

A grim and rather terrifying smile stretched across Rhett's face, and he pulled out his own pistol once again. "You've already taken enough."

“Oh, dear boy. I have taken far more than this. Yet it is never enough.” Mir laughed softly. "That is why I’m King."

Rhett shrugged, finger reaching for the trigger, and-

“Ah, Fischbach. How kind of you to join us,” Mir said.

Rhett glanced to the second floor, to the railing, where a thoroughly exhausted-looking Mark was resting half his weight on one of the older spuds and half on the railing.

Mark murmured something to the spud helping him, then pulled his arm away from said spud and rested his weight fully on the railing. Slowly, he dragged himself towards the stairs. He looked like a ghost, an apparition, shambling through the rafters and swathed in bandages. Rhett heard one or two of the more superstitious men whisper a soft prayer to themselves at the sight.

Mir waited calmly, completely ignoring everyone else. Of course, with both of his bimbos near him, he could afford to do that.

“It doesn’t seem you have much in the way of speaking abilities right now, but that’s alright.” Mir smiled faintly. “You hand yourself over, I’ll take everyone and leave. No more death.”

Mark paused, then looked straight at Mir and gave an undeniable nod, though once he began moving again he didn’t move any more quickly.

“Mark no.” Rhett murmured. “Don’t-”

Don’t make Link’s death for nothing.

By the time Mark had gotten himself down one step on the stairs, weight resting on the railing, he was obviously trembling, even from the distance between Rhett and Mark.

Mir titled his head and said something in Russian, and one of the younger attackers tucked his weapon away and darted up to Mark.

By the time the teen got up the stairs to Mark, Mark had managed to halfway descend another step.

Mark leaned heavily on the railing, wobbling and shaking wildly, then crumpled.

The teen caught Mark and carefully scooped him up, then, as Mark stirred disorientedly, just as carefully made his way down the stairs, Mark in arms.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” Mir said as the teen carrying Mark walked over. “I’ll be sure to take proper care of him.”

He gestured and said something in Russian, and, almost as quickly as they’d come, Mir and his men were gone.

And so was Mark.

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas  
> Merr Chrisms  
> Mer Crism  
> Mir Crisis


End file.
